[2025] EWCA Civ 1134

Following the email of 15 May 2025, Somani received no further communication from the Council’s enforcement or legal team and no enforcement officers visited the Hotel. Somani was first made aware of the launch of the injunction proceedings when its non-litigation solicitor was served with unsealed papers during the afternoon of 11 August 2025. A director of Somani received a copy by email and immediately referred the matter to CTM for advice and to request them to advise the Home Office. CTM advised that they would review the matter with their in-house legal team and provide advice the following morning. Somani instructed litigation lawyers who moved at speed to instruct counsel and to prepare, at short notice, for the hearing before the judge. On 12 August 2025, formal service of the application and relevant documents by the Council on Somani took place.

Somani raised with the Council a preliminary issue regarding its failure to include CTM, the service provider, as a party. CTM is contracted by the Home Office to provide accommodation to asylum seekers. The Council confirmed that it did not intend to serve CTM or seek to include them as a party. Somani contended that the difficulty this created was that while it provides the physical facility, it was CTM, on behalf of the Home Office, which booked the premises and which manages and organises the movement and stay of asylum seekers. They claimed that the absence of CTM as a party hampered Somani’s ability to obtain exact details as to current levels of demand, the nature of the occupants and their length of stay, and the ramifications of the grant of an injunction to those occupants and the Home Office. In previous similar cases, the service provider had been the second defendant and provided this relevant information to the court.